Dáil debates

Thursday, 19 November 2020

Combating Domestic, Sexual and Gender-Based Violence: Statements

 

2:40 pm

Photo of Neale RichmondNeale Richmond (Dublin Rathdown, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the opportunity to contribute to this important and timely debate. I thank the two Ministers present for their obvious commitment and factual work on this. I pay credit to my county colleague, Deputy Carroll MacNeill. She has contributed a great deal of time, professionally as well as politically, not only to the issue of domestic abuse but coercive control as well. It shows the power each of us have in the roles we hold.

Unfortunately, when we are dealing with this topic we know we all have constituents who have made representations to our offices and who need a transfer on the housing list. They need to have a conversation about it because, ultimately, barring orders do not always have the required effect. Prison sentences do not last forever. Many people, nearly all of them women, are living in fear and their children are living in fear. What will happen when the knock on the door comes or when the person might see someone in the street? We need to bear that in mind with all our statements. We need bear in mind not only the anecdotal evidence but the statistical evidence that we have all poured through. Indeed, the statistics are shocking. Deputy Funchion made the point earlier that perhaps they have always been there but now they are actually being reported.

3 o’clock

We know the reporting levels in Ireland are painfully low compared to other European jurisdictions. The fact that reports to An Garda Síochána are up 25% is a worry and perhaps those reports only scratch the surface.

I will put one practical suggestion to the Minister. The system used in the UK is the silent solution, whereby one makes a phone call but, as we have seen in the advertisements and we know the situations, one might not be in a position to talk through fear or anything else. Simply pressing 55 on a mobile phone, however, alerts the police who make their way to the caller's location. That is the sort of practical solution that may play a part in allowing or encouraging more people to come forward. They should not have to come forward because these disgusting acts should not be happening. They should not have been happening 50 years ago and they certainly should not be happening today. Every one of us is right to stand here in this Oireachtas and condemn it from a height.

I concur in the comments from Deputy Duncan Smith when it comes to the sharing of revenge porn and sexual abuse images. I welcome the commitment by the Minister and the justice committee to proceed with this legislation as quickly as possible. As Deputy Smith said earlier, there is a particular responsibility on men, particularly men of a similar vintage to me and Deputy Smith, to call this out, not just in the Chamber when we are speaking in refined parliamentary tones, but to call it out on WhatsApp and social media and to say to our peers, friends, acquaintances, the lads in the team or whoever it may be that this is not on. The sharing of the personal, private details of a friend or someone who thought you were a friend, of a loved one, or of someone's sister, daughter or mother is abhorrent and disgusting. It needs to end and we need to provide for legal ramifications for it.

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